the story ch 4

note to self: this post is for the update that i should've posted on...... wednesday 1/4

the israelites flourished in egypt. this is now a long time after jacob & sons died. there was a new pharaoh in the land that didn't look favorably upon the israelites flourishing in egypt. so he became jealous, and to spite them, he made them into slaves and put them to labor.
but even through oppression, israelites did not cease to grow in numbers and become widespread. so now pretty much all the egyptians hated the israelites.
->i feel like i have the heart of an egyptian most of the time. i'm a very jealous person :(

pharaoh gave a ridiculous order to have all hebrew boys thrown into the nile river. a levite man and levite woman had a son, and she kept hi for three months. but then she couldn't hide him anymore, so she sent him down in a basket on the nile. then the pharaoh's daughter found the baby and decided to raise him. this baby was named moses.

moses grew up and became an adult and saw that the egyptians were oppressing his own people. when he witnessed an egyptian beating a hebrew man, he killed the egyptian and hid the body.
-> :-O i didn't know moses did this.

moses ran away and went to live in a place called midian. although he was on the run for murder, i guess deep down his heart/intentions were for justice/good, and he helped rescue some women that came to fetch water from shepherds that tried to drive these women away from the well. moses married one of the daughters.

the israelites that were enslaved cried out to God. God was concerned about them so He sought out moses. he appeared to moses in flames of fire that seemed to be burning the bush. God told moses that he picked moses to send to egypt and bring israelites out of there. but moses didn't think he could do the job and kept on telling God to send someone else. God told him over and over that God will be with moses and he has nothing to worry about.
-> why did God pick moses? moses was of the lineage of adam/eve/noah/important ppl from the earlier days? moses said that he wasn't a very eloquent speaker and there were other people that could do the job better but God was adamant that moses was the one. and also, moses was a murderer. yes i can see that he felt that he had to stand up for his people but he executed it in a terrible way. oh so then maybe this was God giving moses another chance. yes he committed murder, but this was God's way of redeeming moses despite his sinfulness by giving him the job to rescue the israelites admirably and righteously, through holy anointing and blessing from God.
-> moses might have felt like he was a nobody and maybe felt sad/still guilty about his past sins... and i wonder if he thought that there was no way he could be holy enough to face God. (it does say that when moses first encountered God in the bushes, he hid his face b/c he was afraid to face God)
-> for me... there's so many times throughout the day when i feel like my old mistakes and sins are catching up to me and i can't outrun them all. and i feel like i can't even ask God for help. but like with moses, God shows once again that he is almighty - i mean, he MADE us... so i'm thankful that i can turn to God. i don't have answers right now and i'm not sure where things are gonna be going, but there's a master that's above everything in my small little world.